It has an average battery life of around 5 hours, 30 minutes according to reports, and most reviewers have pointed out that the audio quality is good overall. The Intel UHD 620 graphics won’t win any awards for gaming performance, but it will allow you to run some classic titles well, and even some newer titles on low settings (see this video). It also comes with USB 3.1 with a reversible USB C connector for super fast data transfers. ASUS’s new Vivobook F510UA-AH51 15.6-inch laptop offers a great performance for the price, and its portability and solid construction makes it well suited for business people constantly travelling.
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If an SSD is out of your budget, we highly recommend purchasing, at least, a 1TB hard drive with a 7,200-rpm speed. However, instead of an either/or situation, we recommend choosing a configuration that has both an SSD and a hard drive. That way you can load your games and important files on the speedy SSD and have plenty of room left for everything else.
As far as storage is concerned, hard drive prices have come down compared with solid-state drives, so finding large capacities isn't too much trouble. 1TB of storage and maybe even a small SSD alongside are common in budget laptops. The display will almost certainly be 1080p (1,920-by-1,080 resolution), as 720p is now reserved only for cheap non-gaming systems and increasingly uncommon. The RAM will likely top off at 8GB in budget laptops, but you will find some (more ideal) 16GB laptops in this range.
EXPIRES TODAY Doorbuster Deal Starting 5AM EST. Dell has the Alienware 17 Intel Core i7-8750H Six-Core 17.3" 1080p Gaming Laptop (8GB GeForce GTX 1070 OC, 16GB RAM, 256GB M.2 SSD + 1TB HDD) for a low $1599.99 Free Shipping. This normally retails for $2000, so you're saving $400 off with this deal. This sold out yesterday within minutes, we expect it to sell out quick! More Details
Nvidia Max-Q Design - Nvidia has teamed with laptop manufacturers to create Max-Q, a new design specification which focuses on efficiency rather than performance. Essentially downclocking Nvidia GPUs can place a powerful 1080 GPU into the 0.5-inch thick Asus ROG Zephyrus. With less power being consumed, the system is producing less heat, which means the fans aren't being used as much. That means you get a system that's cooler and quieter than your typical gaming laptop and nearly as powerful. Max-Q designed GPUs will include the 1060, 1070 and 1080 GPUs.
Razer isn’t exaggerating when it calls its Blade 15 (available on Amazon) the “world’s smallest 15-inch gaming laptop.” While it’s impressive to get a six-core 8th gen Core i7-8750H and GeForce GTX 1070 Max-Q performance into a compact chassis, note that it’s densely packed and feels heavy for its size. If you can deal with the additional weight, the payoff may well be worth it. Read our review.
Acer’s Predator Helios 300 is a budget-oriented Predator model with great parts at an affordable price. It sports an Intel Core i7-7700HQ processor, GTX 1060 GPU, 16GB DDR4 memory, and a 15.6-inch full HD (1920 x 1080) 16:9 display. A laundry list of ports, including HDMI, will ensure you have enough room to plug any accessories or peripherals into the Predator.
Mice that are specially designed for RTS games and MMOs, on the other hand, look quite different. The most extreme come outfitted with an array of 10 or more programmable buttons. Usually set just under the tip of the thumb, these buttons can serve as simple shortcut triggers, or be programmed to execute longer macro commands. (For more on these mice, see our specialized guide to the best mice for MMO games.)
MSI have had a 'warranty void if removed' sticker under their machines for years. Check before you buy as it can make upgrading painful. Forget about spindle drives, get a smaller SSD and just use an external drive if you have to. Loading a spindle drive just chews power, slows everything down, and makes noise and heat. They are the suck. Higher res screens require more powerful GFX cards due to the higher resolution. Think carefully about the 4k screen if you're only getting a low end GPU. Get a low latency wireless network card that supports the highest wireless range you can get. There's no point limiting your new machine to last years bandwidth. Think about a game controller to save your keyboard from being mashed. Replacing a laptop keyboard = expensive. Buy a decent mouse as well, SteelSeries and Razor make some great units. Lastly, think about the life cycle of your laptop : they do not last forever so work out when you'll likely want/need to sell it and buy a new one. You want to do that while it's still worth something. You also don't want to be stuck with a high end laptop thats out of warranty which developes a problem. Selling it while it's still valuable means your new machine costs less.

The Asus TUF Gaming FX504GM has Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 graphics and a high-refresh-rate 120 Hz display, and in our tests it kept its WASD keys cool enough. But we found that it suffered from a rattly trackpad, a poor three-hour battery life, and terrible speakers, and it’s much harder to upgrade than the Dell G7—you have to remove 11 screws and take off the whole underside of the chassis, as opposed to the G7’s single screw and convenient panel. The FX504GM also has poor build quality; the chassis felt hollow to us, and the keyboard deck and lid flexed easily under pressure. We also experienced some unexpectedly low performance across multiple games and benchmarks. We’ve reached out to Asus to investigate that issue, but for now, we can’t recommend the FX504GM.

Here’s the deal: You don’t need to spend a lot of money to play awesome games! But with hundreds of options, finding a powerful and affordable gaming laptop can be tricky. That’s why we’ve created this expert buying guide to show you the best cheap gaming laptops you can buy! We’ve researched over 40 new products and selected the top budget laptops. All of them offer a great mix of performance and value. Ready? Let’s do this!
Sizing up the current state of the gaming laptop market, 8th Generation CPUs for notebooks are still the default, although we've seen at least one laptop with the Core i9-9900K. NVIDIA has launched their desktop GPU refresh with the Turing based GeForce RTX lineup, but as of yet has not done the same for their laptop chips, so Pascal based GeForce GTX still rules the roost. On the AMD side, mobile Vega was not dead, as some feared, but is currently only available in the latest MacBook Pro, and not yet in gaming laptops.
*Rewards are issued to your online Dell Advantage Loyalty Rewards Account (available via your Dell.com My Account) typically within 30 business days after your order’s ship date; Rewards expire in 90 days (except where prohibited by law). “Current rewards balance” amount may not reflect the most recent transactions. Check Dell.com My Account for your most up-to-date reward balance. Up to 6% rewards only on Dell Preferred Account purchases. Up to 3% rewards on all other purchases. Bose products only eligible for up to 3% rewards. Total rewards earned may not exceed $2,000 within a 3 month period. Outlet purchases do not qualify for rewards. Expedited Delivery not available on certain TVs, monitors, batteries and adapters, and is available in Continental (except Alaska) U.S. only. Other exceptions apply. Not valid for resellers and/or online auctions. See Dell.com/rewardsfaq.
Like the Logitech gaming keyboard of the same name, the Logitech Pro mouse is a simple and intuitive product. Despite its feature-heavy nature, it's very newcomer friendly: the lower central button adjusts DPI presets, while the standard center button toggles the mouse wheel between loose and granular. A handsome, detachable braided cable is a nice touch, making it easy to bundle this mouse up for traveling, if you're so inclined.
The viewing angles do suffer somewhat due to it being a lower quality TN panel, however, but it does come with touch screen functionality at least. The case is made of all plastic and feels somewhat cheap, and its look isn’t much to write home about according to some users, but these aesthetics are generally affiliated with budget laptops. Fortunately it is reasonably lightweight, so you can take it along with you without much of hassle.
I’m not a gamer, so I’ve always managed to get by very well with basic rodents that have each kept the treadmill turning smoothly for many pleasingly uneventful years; but I did find the review refreshingly informative – which is a light-year from the response to my very first mousey inquiry. Way back in 1994 when I was researching to buy my first Pentium P series computer, I phoned a well known (in those days) computer dealer to find out which mouse they would recommend. The sales person was evidently dumbfounded – I could visualize her raising her eyes to the heavens as she said, with affected patience, “A mouse is a mouse, isn’t it?”. It’s the kind of remark that has you promptly closing their showroom door behind you, never to return, and seeking out a more inspiring vendor.

Of course, this is an entry-level gaming laptop and you should expect that some games have to be played on medium settings. However, you can expand this laptop later. For example, it has a second RAM slot for additional memory and an m.2 slot for a solid-state drive. Overall, this is a very good budget laptop with plenty of features at a great price point.

I looked at that one. My sager 9873 (the clevo at the bottom of the list) runs circles around it. I have the z170+7700k model with 1080sli and asus is overpriced in comparison. So for a starting price of $2800 i got a SOCKETED desktop i7 and DUAL 1080'S with a 120hz 1440p gsync monitor. That asus uses a wattage throttled u series cpu and a single 1080 for $900 more. Dont get me wrong, i love asus products, my rog spatha is excellent, but please dont call that the best one, not in the desktop replacement category. Go to notebook review forums and open the bga elitist forum and say that. You will be laughed out of that thread. Not that i have an upgrade path, but i can replace my cpu. Right there, match that with that asus. And to anyone who is wondering, xiotic is the worst place to buy a clevo. Sager is good, and cheaper, and where i got mine, but if you can afford it go to eurocom. Unlocked bios, options to get your cpu delidded fron silicon lottery, and they also make a custom power supply for it. And in case you were wondering, cpu stays at 4.5ghz, all core, and my gpu's, yes plural, use a clevo specific mxm that keeps them around 1750. The 32Gb of 2666 ddr4 is probably why my cpu overclocks just that little bit, and i 'got lucky' with my silicon. But a U in the cpu is evil in this category, even HK. My 'laptop' has even gotten me laid, once, and she never called back, but still....

You'll see both ordinary hard drives and swifter (but lesser-capacity) solid-state drives (SSDs) in under-$1,000 laptops. The occasional 15.6-inch-screen model might offer a small-capacity SSD boot drive alongside a secondary-storage platter hard drive, though this is more common with 17-inch laptops. Opt for this dual-drive approach if you can find it and afford it. The smaller SSD would be home to the operating system and a few favorite games, and the larger, more economical hard drive would host the rest of your games and other programs that don't need quick loading times. (It's indeed possible to split your Steam game library across drives.)

As you might expect, a $1,300 gaming laptop won’t perform as well as a top-of-the-line one—but not everyone has $2,000 to spend on a high-end gaming laptop. Our cheaper gaming laptop picks can still play many AAA games on high settings at 1920×1080 resolution, with exceptions for very new or demanding games such as Shadow of the Tomb Raider or Assassin’s Creed Odyssey. It’ll serve you well for classic games and less-demanding modern ones like Overwatch, Playerunknown’s Battlegrounds, or Doom (2016), and you can expect it to play most games on at least medium settings for the next few years.

Bear in mind that this is a flagship mouse from Logitech, so if you are concerned about paying a high price, you are also getting some of the finest features, regardless of you needing them or not. With that said, if you are wondering about us encountering any downsides, there aren’t any deal breakers here. Sure, the mouse carries a hefty price tag, and the overall aesthetics of the ambidextrous design might put off some design conscious people, but under the hood, the Chaos Spectrum happens to be one of the MOST powerful, and over the top brilliant gaming mice we have used. So with that out of the way, pros and cons, shall we?

The bargain-priced Lenovo Legion Y530 (available via Lenovo) could be a good entry-level gaming laptop if you manage your expectations. It’s impressively portable and has a solid feature set. Unfortunately its middling graphics card struggles to deliver buttery visuals from today’s AAA games, and its performance will only go downhill as more demanding titles come down the pike. Read our review.
One of the perks of living in the 21st century is the constant stream of technology that is available for us to use. The majority of people know how to use laptops and computers, but most of us are not computer wizards. The majority of people use simple computer skills for work and leisure purposes, whom I would define as an average computer user. As a college student who uses the internet for leisure and study purposes as well as basic Microsoft Office functions, I would classify myself as an average computer user. Thus, I am writing this review for the average computer user.
Most gaming laptops have a “chicklety” keyboard. If you can’t stand this type of keyboard, your only real alternative is to connect a better-quality external model. However, if you only ever use your keyboard for pressing the ZQSD keys, its quality will not really be an important factor. The same can be said about a computer’s trackpad which can always be replaced with an external mouse for greater in-game accuracy.
It looks good, too. With an RGB-backlit keyboard and attractive orange highlights, there’s no mistaking the fact that this machine is pitched at gamers, not everyday users. There are more expensive models available, but of the range we reckon this is one of the best value options. If you want to pay more, consider the higher-spec Dell Inspiron 15 7000 Gaming with its 4K , IPS panel.
Shane Roberts of Lifehacker reviewed the Logitech G560 PC Gaming Speaker, inviting readers to “come for the sound, stay for the light show.” Calling the Logitech G560 “feature-packed,” he shared that the “most notable is the side and rear-firing game-driven four zone RGB lighting that extends the scene from your monitor to the rest of your gaming space,” noting he “had even more fun with the music visualizer option.”
The best gaming mice offer comfort and customization that will please a wide range of users, but in some cases, the core features of a mouse revolve around certain kinds of games. Blazing away in a firefight, staving off an advancing horde in a real-time strategy (RTS) title, or commanding an NFL franchise: Game genres have specific needs, and some mice outright target specific ones.
While its performance for modern games will be on the lower end, its value is excellent and it will at least allow you to play games such as Overwatch, CS:GO, DOTA 2 and other popular titles will be playable, albeit at reduced settings. One aspect of the E 15 E5-576-392H that may seem impressive is that it packs a 1920 x 1080 15.6-inch display. Sadly, it is of poor quality. Its lowly TN panel offers poor viewing angles and the colors looked washed out, which are issues that generally plague TN panels.
Measurements performed by our colleagues at the Laptopmag website show that the MSI Titan achieves a maximum temperature of 59 degrees after 15 minutes of gameplay – which is not too bad. The Asus ROG Zephyrus has a maximum temperature of 67 degrees – which is still OK. However, the MSI GS65 Stealth’s maximum temperature of 90 degrees is likely to be problematic for some users.

That said, a maxed-out Core i7 CPU is less crucial for gaming than it is for processor-intensive tasks such as video editing and media-file production work. With current-generation Intel CPUs, you'll get plenty of pep even from a four-core "Coffee Lake"/8th Generation Core i5. A Core i7 of the same generation is actually a hefty six-core/12-thread processor that, we'd argue, is overkill for casual gamers who need to mind what they spend. So, our bottom line: Opt for a Core i5 or i7 chip with four true cores if you can; a six-core chip is gravy.

The SteelSeries Rival is a very solid mouse, but it's also very specialized: I have a feeling if you need this mouse, you know about it already. The key feature of the Rival 500 is the sheer amount of programmable buttons this thing has. With 15 different buttons in tow, it's basically a keyboard replacement! This is a setup that's ideal for games with lots of macros of cooldown skills—think MMOs or even MOBAs.
The subtle graphics of the Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 3GB is being based on the latest Pascal-architecture, providing desktop performances to a laptop. Testing the FPS (Frames per Second) on titles such as Hitman (49 FPS); Rise of the Tomb Raider (48 FPS); Shadow of Mordor (87 FPS) and, Grand Theft Auto V (59.2 FPS), have shown no difficulties in achieving well enough FPS. Even though the FX502VM is not placed on the market with Gsync support, it does not use Optimus.
Powerful hardware isn’t the only consideration. A gaming laptop’s processor and graphics card produce a lot of heat, and if the laptop doesn’t have an effective cooling system, it can overheat. The laptop also needs a good keyboard and solid build quality. Even though Nvidia’s GeForce GTX 1070 can run games on high settings at 4K resolution, we still recommend 1080p displays because 4K screens are currently too expensive for most of our readers.

These “simple” hardware configurations usually do not feature an RBG backlit keyboard (they usually just have red backlighting), nor do they include a QHD or 4K display or an advanced audio system. Generally speaking, the display on this type of computer is also not G-Sync compatible and only operates at a frequency of 60 Hz (versus the 120-144 Hz of displays used on more sophisticated and expensive gaming laptops). What’s more, during sales events it is not uncommon to be able to purchase an affordable gaming laptop equipped with a GTX 1060 graphics chip for under 1000 dollars.

Some manufacturers have opted for an intermediate and less expensive solution; that is to say, a hybrid hard drive (SSHD) which incorporates a very small SSD (8 GB) in order to optimize the storage system’s performance. However, the performance of this type of drive remains slightly inferior to that of a fully fledged SSD. Intel’s Optane technology is used on some of these hybrid systems, and it works quite well…
The three most important hardware components of this laptop (namely CPU, GPU, and RAM) work well together to deliver excellent budget gaming performance. The 2.6 GHz Intel Core i7-4720HQ quad-core processor actually clocks in at over 10,000 points in GeekBench, which is a great score for this price. You also get 8GB of DDR3 RAM, plus Nvidia's acclaimed GeForce GTX 960M with 2 GB GDDR5 VRAM. It's a very good combination, in our opinion, allowing you to run a lot of current games on high to very high settings with steadily high FPS.
Alienware laptops are known for their cool designs and high-end specifications which deliver a superior gaming experience. It features an Intel Core i7 7th Gen processor and 8 GB of RAM, along with a 6 GB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 graphics card which runs almost all the advanced games seamlessly. Its 1 TB HDD and 256 GB SDD provides ample space to store your pictures, videos and music.